Chennai-based PM Digital Products commissions India’s first Scodix S74

Established in 2005, PM Digital Products is a partnership company and digital wing of 60 years old Palaniappa Brothers, the book publisher and printer. The machine was supplied by the Indian distributor of Scodix machines, Monotech Systems.

Chellappan, managing partner, PMDP said, “This technology has been introduced for the first time in Asia. We opted for this machine to beat the competition in our market. We want to make print more appealing and want our customers to feel the product rather than just see it. This will take printing to a higher level. We want to provide full solution to the customers and all the processes are done in our printing facility at Chennai.”

“At a very basic level one can say it is a wonderful replacement for Spot UV as the gloss level it delivers is far superior. But in reality this technology offers much more. It not only gives gloss but also texture and depth to the print.  In a normal Die Embossing process, the back side of the sheet has a negative impression. This is disturbing and the back side cannot be properly used. But Digital Embossing delivers a perfectly flat back side.

Hence one can opt for embossing on both sides of the page. Since this machine is fully digital it good for proofing also apart from regular production at 500 sheets per hour. It can accept both Digital and Offset printed sheets. Coated, Uncoated and Laminated paper and boards can be used in addition to other synthetic materials. Even though it is an offline process it can deliver accurate registration. The maximum sheet size it can handle is 20x29-inches (B2),” included Chellappan.

“It is a new technology. Designers will have to understand the capabilities and creatives will have to be evolved with that in mind. Hence, all the design houses will be on our radar. Currently, we are using this machine for high end customers’ jobs as well as for variable data printing,” added Chellappan.

The company has offset and digital printing facility under one roof, the digital wing of the company includes HP Indigo 3500 and IBM Ricoh mono printer. The offset unit includes a four-colour sheetfed Komori Lithrone printing press with a sheet-size of 18x25-inches, a 23x36-inches two-colour perfecting printing machine from Polygraph and two Indian-made web-offset printing presses.

Comparing the digital and offset technology, he said, “Digital is a complementing technology and not a competing technology to offset. The volume determines the technology. With increasing adoption of on-demand publishing, digital is going to play a very big role.”

The more than half-a-century-old book-publishing and printing company also undertakes commercial printing work including visiting cards, calendars, loyalty cards and many others on the entire range of printable media.

The company produces around four million books a year for its book publishing wing with a well-equipped post-press unit including a 12 station gathering machine, a 6 clamp perfect binding machine and a 4 knife trimmer from Welbound and an automatic creasing machine. PMDP consumes around 3000 sheets of A3 size per day in digital and around 700 tons of paper per annum in offset.

The entire 13,000 sq/ft printing facility runs under one roof. The printing segment of the group, which has a turnover of Rs 6-crore, employs around 200 people.

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